Tales from the Stinky Dragon - [Second Wind] Vengeance in Vainia - C02 - Ep 43 - Fengpik and Choose

Episode Date: April 16, 2024

Join Gus, Chris, and Micah for a DM Fueled Second Wind! They discuss theories on where Eddy has gone, how the party interacts with the Sferatu, and most common mistakes when writing or playing your first campaign! Join us on Discord: https://discord.gg/roosterteeth Check out our merch and follow us on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and more: https://linktr.ee/TalesFromTheStinkyDragon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey little stinkers, until we figure out the future of the show, any upcoming premium content is going to be free to everyone. I just want to say thank you for supporting the show. Hello, welcome to Second Wind, here we go. My name's Gus, I'm the Dungeon Master for Tales from the Stinky Dragon. With me... Chris Damaris, who plays Barney Farney. Barney Farney. Micah, the editor, writer, composer for this show. And, more importantly, birthday boy. Birthday boy!

It is my birthday. We just finished recording episode 43 of the Groteth campaign of Tales from the Stinky Dragon. The party finally exited the clawstread, got to Fangpick. What do you think about it? What's going on here, Chris? I mean, there's still a lot on here, Chris? Um, I mean

There's There's just it's still a lot of questions and we're I feel like we're slowly getting answers and pieces to the puzzle But it's like, you know, have you ever done a puzzle? Yes And you start and like you're sorting them by color and stuff you're like, oh, yeah These probably go over here. These probably go over here These probably go over there and you're like, I'll start getting easier as you start putting these pieces in But it doesn't really get easy until like right in when you're like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah It's I feel like it's like that. We're just like organizing puzzle pieces and slowly you've got all your edge pieces

Yeah, and now you're just working on like filling out the middle and then the cat comes over and bats off The last puzzle I did Missing one piece really yeah, yeah, yeah, I I It was at a coffee shop, and I nearly tore the coffee shop apart looking for that last piece You never found it. No how long were the coffee shop you did a puzzle well It was like halfway done, and then it was like we sat there. I was waiting for a bus. It was a long wait for a bus. Yeah.

And, yeah, it started doing the puzzle, and, yeah, it didn't finish. Anyway, what's up? So I think, you know, every time we do a second one, we have a – we prime the audience for questions. There's things that we can talk about, and we try to talk about some of our fun moments, favorite parts of the episode. And I think that he's not here, but I think Mati trying to get hemo pieces from every Sfra too was a, was a great running gag.

It was really an inspired piece of playing. John did that before, not with tithing, like in a religious sense, but he, oh, he bet it. That's what he did.

He bet in the brawl. Oh yeah i was like john wants some money he's going for it uh that honestly i thought the most clever moment was john putting the fruit in the mort apple in the app in the in the stew? The stew? The blood buckets. Okay. Blood buckets. I thought that was really smart. Really clever. Yeah.

It was a good idea. We should play a game sometime and just have, like, play the whole session and then have Chris write down everything that happened. Oh. And just see what happened. See? Line up the two modules. It would be like when he draws a map.

Yeah. When we go somewhere and then seeing what he drew Versus what the reality actually is Which is one of my favorite running gags that we do So I'm going to ask you another question Chris What happened to Eddie? Y'all had him cornered in the sepulcher Did Eddie Was Eddie in the coffin that got drug around?

I don't know I'm asking you I was like I got it I had that like Bert my mic just rose I Was like that's that's the only thing I could think of because we searched everything there were no seemingly no trapdoors or anything and then like that little Helper dude was like I'm I'm getting out of here and drugged the cat coffin away, and I was like that's probably it

That's probably it, but why would Eddie why would Eddie want to go in there Eddie was in there? I didn't know You broke Chris's brain wait Eddie what hmm wait was that Eddie gosh darn it Like who's Eddie yeah, we met an NPC named Eddie? I don't know anymore. Yeah. So I think there was a lot of fun exploration. So, you know, episodes like this always make me a little nervous. Because sometimes, you know, Micah, when you have a module, it's very clear.

There's a very, like, clear flow to it. The party's going to flow to it the party's going to do this the party's going to go here they're going to do this like it's a very linear approach to it episodes like this is very wide open it's just like an area with different rooms it's like and it's just descriptions of the rooms it's a lot more like we're at i feel like at the mercy of the party and what they're going to do and how are they going to try to break things and poke at the edges and uh and um do whatever it is that they do yeah so i always get a little a little nervous i think it's it's funny that i've had multiple people like in the cast and crew like mentioned that this is a unique arc uh the way we played it and i think part of that is like yeah it's it's one thing to do a sandbox out in the wilderness like you can do

that and it's very possible um it takes a lot of preparation yes but if you do it in enclosed space where it is limited it like there are like a finite amount of rooms in this place then you it's a lot more fill in the boxes and there is a lot more prep but it's it's a lot more manageable i think and so like yeah you can let them run free and just see what happens. And I think that really came across in the way the party interacted with the Sfratu a lot this episode, specifically where at first they're hiding and they're afraid,

then Elga comes up with this idea to play hide-and-sink with them, and then by the end of it, they're sitting next to them on a pew, stealing money from them, and then trying to relieve them from their duty, telling them they're off the watch and taking over. I feel like we got better at dealing with them.

Yeah. I was talking with someone who's DMing as well, just started DMing and like they were saying like they weren't expecting the party to do this or that. I'm like, yep, that's D&D. Yeah. Yeah. So like sometimes, you know, they come across this like, I really don't think this should work or this should happen,

but the roles are good and I like the idea. It's like, yeah, sure, we'll go with it. We'll see what happens. What's the worst that can happen? They win, guys. Yeah, in the end, as long as everyone's having fun. That's it. Okay, so I want to hit up a few questions

that we primed from the audience here for everyone here So lady ghost ghost asks when playing for the first time when writing your first campaign What's the most common mistake? Is there anything obviously you should think of and or avoid I? I can say from whenever I wrote The Chosen Ones, there were places where I overprepared. Where I was like, I wrote out too much. I was like, oh, and also it might be worth, you know, we do shorter sessions. But like I overprepared and over had all these different things. There's no way they were all going to get to it.

I think also one thing I realized is when you go into a location, not to over describe the location, because it can be like overwhelming for like to try and visualize and think through everything. But just like give a baseline thing. And then as the party explores, then you reveal more for what they look into you know because then i think when you leave it open-ended and the party's asking questions you find out what they're interested in you can fill in those blanks as opposed to like filling in blanks that don't need to be filled yeah like you don't have to describe every little detail of everything in the giant room yeah i think one of the things that i learned early on as a, as a DM or writer is like, you're going to make mistakes. Um, I think that's, that's a farce thinking that like,

you can know all the rules. You can know exactly what the party is going to do or have an answer for everything. The party wants an answer for, and it's not true. Um, give yourself a break. Like when, especially when you're DMing for the first time and it's a homebrew campaign or something like that. You're going to make mistakes and if you need to, take a break. Or if you need to, just say, I don't know the answer right now, but we can answer that after.

Or make up something and just go with that for the time being. And sometimes that's easier said than done. But as a player, I think there's a couple of home rules that you want to keep in mind with like just you want the party to work together that's one so don't be don't take the spotlight all the time and and like um steamroll over what else someone else wants to do

and make sure everybody's having fun like role play if you're comfortable with that if you're not like maybe say this is what my character does and like and be descriptive about it that kind of thing i think another thing too is um and this is more on a player side is but if you're dming maybe like whenever you're on session zero maybe encouraging your players to not there's like a trope of like the lone wolf who like doesn't like talking to people and it's like well that not necessarily a good dynamic for a party. You want a character who wants to engage with people and wants to meet the party, because otherwise if they're just a lone wolf who doesn't want to talk to people,

then it's like, yeah, they're just not. Then you can play a solo D&D sesh with your DM. But yeah, encouraging players to create a character that has a reason to want to talk to the other players. That's a good one. To Micah's earlier point about making mistakes and looking stuff up, I've been playing D&D over 30 years across many editions. In this episode, or last episode, I still have to look up what specifically does stunned say? What does that entail? Don't be afraid to look it up. Be like, yeah, know let's read it let's find out and sometimes sometimes you come across a weird thing like in the last episode like yeah

a flying creature stunned does it fall you know and sometimes you just gotta you gotta go with it and figure it out and don't be afraid to to open up a book and read yeah i i play with some people that have been playing for years as well and i haven't played for a long long time i've only been playing for a couple years now or a few years now and um that person that i play with uh has always added their proficiency bonus to damage which is not in the rules it means like they always hit really like high damage and so we finally pointed that to them they've been playing for years i'm pretty sure i was like that's actually not how you play yeah you can't you can't have a shield with a bow and arrow yeah yeah yeah the proficiency bonus should help you hit yeah that doesn't help you get harder right interesting it's just rules like

that's why they have you reference them you have a book or you have a like a cheat sheet or something like that is always really helpful how did you figure that out how did you figure that out how did that come about that y'all because they do the math out loud? So like we don't we don't use digital dice We like roll everything in and do stats and stuff and like they were the way they were adding things up didn't make sense Hmm or I think also they said it to someone else like oh you should add like this to your thing cuz you're this right You're proficient in this I'm like no, that's Like the the backlog of like all the damage that they took is turned on them.

They're not actually dead. They're all here now. Yeah. From, so this is, I think this is a very pertinent question, especially considering the episode that we just recorded here. From Emily Womily asks, what is, or is there any presence of gods or deities in Groteth? And we've talked about this in the past about the great ma and the great pa.

And I think that now, you know, in this episode, specifically the parties finding like religious temples and ceremonies that they're, that they're coming across. So I think it's, it's starting to get fleshed out a bit more, maybe not necessarily the great mom, pa, like

explicitly, like we were, like we've talked about in the past, but you know, there is maybe, um, some stuff to be explored there. Yeah, for sure. Um, I've, I'm not being cagey about it. Uh, I just know that like the way I built the the world you have to dig in certain places to find out uh about spirituality and i think that that's the thing about gritteth as well is like even even our cast like our party members are we have a monk and a cleric and neither of them are super religious in the way they play is that accurate yeah yeah um and i think that that's telling of like how even the world is kind of because i because you have all kinds of people that say they're religious or came up with an upbringing and stuff like that.

So it just depends. But I think that's part of the mystery as well. The cast keeps asking, what is the deal with Ma and Pa? You know what else I want to know? You didn't submit a question in Discord, so we can't answer it. I'm just thinking about, this is a way, way back thing. Whenever, who, I don't remember who we were fighting, but every time we got knocked out, there were, like, voices talking to us.

And I'm like, we never got any answers to that. That's another puzzle piece. I was going to say, another puzzle piece. Because in this group, it won't fit. It's not an edge piece Well speaking of which There's somewhat a related question from shell asking Was there ever a moment in both campaigns where you were seriously considering killing off a player because they made you so angry with something

They did in character and I think it's related to that I think Emily Wembley again had a question that was somewhat similar. It said, have you ever had a monster change its target mid-combat, or an enemy change its target mid-combat to avoid killing one of the characters? Like saving them? Yeah, like saving them. Yeah. I think, I will say, for the changing target one, I try, every round I try to make it make sense who's being attacked.

Whether it's someone in close proximity to the enemy, someone that's damaged them, you know, if they're maybe further away. Or if there's something that's drawing attention. I try to make it make sense. So I don't think I've ever pulled away from someone intentionally unless there was a, like some kind of motivation or reason for them to do that. Yeah, a diversion of some sort. Go ahead. You also roll sometimes to see if it's attacked. If it needs to be more randomized.

Yeah, I'll assign everyone a number and then just roll a die to see who they go after. That's if there is no motivation. Or which direction they go. Yeah, I think it's a weighing game of the balancing the scales of like, you don't want to TPpk the group every time but if you're if you want it to be high risks and high reward then yeah sometimes you you need to knock them down to zero hit points because like it depends on like if you're if you're a party at level one you're going up against a dragon like things are going to happen like party's going to

die um but use it as a narrative device rather than just like punishing you yeah yeah to me i don't know to me it would all go back to the story of it and it's like if a character died then they would just need a narrative you know work around another thing on top of that is like if if there is a player um and i've heard many stories like this that is testing the fates like there's a lava pool in front of them And they're like I'm gonna jump in lava pool you take you know 10d 10 fire damage like or if there's a boiling pool But yeah, I mean like don't hold back like if they're gonna you know test you like Them's the rules. There's a

Great Netflix anime series called delicious in dungeon i don't know if either of you watch it yeah but the whole premise of that show is that a party goes in to fight or goes up against the dragon to fight it and one of the party members gets eaten by the dragon and the rest of them are killed and then you know resurrected so then they have to go back into the dungeon to find the dragon to kill it and save their partially digested party member to resurrect them. So it's kind of the same thing where it's like that's almost like if you have a party member die, then it's like that becomes part of the story. And you have to go and try to deal with the aftermath of that. I think that the anime is really good because it deals with party like in D&D parlance, like a party wiping and then getting resurrected.

Yeah. What does it cost and what does it involve and all of that of that's really highly recommended if you're not watching it delicious invention And that's why you always have an extra character sheet with you Could you never know be ready to go? Oh But then following up back to what shell asked was there ever a moment where? Seriously considering killing off a player because they did something to make you angry but whether they did while in character I don't think that's ever come up in these campaign and these two campaigns

I think you've wanted to do damage for sure that was to Chris not to his character Like you want to have fun too and so like if you roll a bunch of ones like yeah It can be funny at first, but like every once in a while You're like okay, it'd be nice to get like a nat 20 Yeah, why not? I think, you know, it's kind of like the DM thing to play up that rivalry, like that, you know, that me versus you kind of thing. You know, in the end, you're all playing together. You're all on the same team, but trying to play up that watch out, I'm going to hurt you.

Yeah, it can be fun to be to play that. Even role playing too, it's fun to play that. You know what I mean? Like if you're the big bad or something like that but it's it's funny to see that happen at tables like the dm enjoying that uh sense of competition not competition but you know what i mean there is like there is a sense of right i also find it more entertaining when combat is like hard you know like okay there's there's a combat where we did really well and things are like cool and like oh yeah we we cast the right spells we did the right we prepped

correctly we're all moving and that's really fun when we're just like oh yeah look how good we did and it's also fun whenever it's like oh crap this we are getting our our butts handed to us and this is like we're Barely coming by and that's that's satisfying too because it's like you've you know to come out of it on the other side you're like Yeah, that was tough We made it. Yeah. Yeah, we did it. It's a it's a thing you shared Yeah, sure any comment, but that middle ground of like yeah This was just like hitting sticks at each other until someone falls down is like less exciting I think that's the difference between like setting up an encounter with just stat blocks

and hitting things, you know, versus like every creature has a motive and tactics and reasons that they're there. I think that really helps flesh it out a bit more. And it seems more realistic, you know, like you were saying, you want to have there to be a flow between how the combat, like who you're focusing on, that kind of thing. Yeah. Again, going back to the last episode, that's why I was very excited to have Mateed outside how the combat like who you're focusing on that kind of thing yeah again going back to last episode So I was very excited to have

Mateed outside of the vamps fire like that idea like oh I'll have one of the Sfratu become mist go outside and then try to drown Mateed or knock Mateed out of the sky Yeah, it didn't end up working out, but it's like fun to try to raise the stakes like that. Yeah All right, I think that's about it for this episode of second win again if you're watching this Thank you so much for supporting the show and for watching the content we make and we'll see you next week And happy birthday to you as well Bye